The
photograph was a very large one, and the likeness to the original so
admirable that the face seemed to smile and radiate with all the
loveliness and beauty of Miss Delamar herself. Stuart beamed upon it
with genuine surprise and pleasure, and exclaimed delightedly to
himself. There was a living quality about the picture which made him
almost speak to it, and thank Miss Delamar through it for the pleasure
she had given him and the honor she had bestowed. He was proud,
flattered, and triumphant, and while he walked about the room deciding
where he would place it, and holding the picture respectfully before
him, he smiled upon it with grateful satisfaction.
He decided against his dressing-table as being too intimate a place
for it, and so carried the picture on from his bedroom to the
dining-room beyond, where he set it among his silver on the sideboard.
But so little of his time was spent in this room that he concluded he
would derive but little pleasure from it there, and so bore it back
again into his library, where there were many other photographs and
portraits, and where to other eyes than his own it would be less
conspicuous.
He tried it first in one place and then in another; but in each
position the picture predominated and asserted itself so markedly,
that Stuart gave up the idea of keeping it inconspicuous, and placed
it prominently over the fireplace, where it reigned supreme above
every other object in the room. It was not only the most conspicuous
object there, but the living quality which it possessed in so marked a
degree, and which was due to its naturalness of pose and the
excellence of the likeness, made it permeate the place like a presence
and with the individuality of a real person.
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